Like a boss – Anime fans pick the top 30 characters they’d like to work for

It’s well known that many anime fans, in the midst of watching a show, start to develop a crush on their favorite character (and sometimes that crush becomes a full–onobsession). But the admiration fans feel towards a 2-D character isn’t always tied to romantic rumblings. Sometimes, they see an anime icon and instead of “I wish that was my girlfriend/boyfriend,” they find themselves thinking “I wish that was my boss!”

Japanese website Charapedia recently completed a poll of 10,000 anime fans, asking them “Which anime character do you think would be a good boss?” As could be expected, 73.2 percent of the respondents were between the ages of 10 and 20, and highlighting the growing number of female otaku, 53.9 percent of the respondents were female.

With so many talented candidates being nominated for the position, let’s dive right into the list of the top 39 responses.

30. Izaya Orihara (Durarara!!)

29. Kazuto Kirigaya (Sword Art Online)

While it’s OK to call him Kirito if you’re patriating in a MMORPG raid together, employees should remember that it’s Mr. Kirigaya at the office.

28. Misato Katsuragi (Neon Genesis Evangelion)

27. Koshi Sugawara (Haikyuu!!)

26. Asuna Yuki (Sword Art Online)

25. Eli Ayase (Love Live!)

24. Bright Noa (Mobile Suit Gundam)

Kind of odd to see Captain Noa make the list of people fans would like to work under, since his most famous motivational technique is “Slapping Dudes in the Face.”

23. Makoto Tachibana (Free!)

22. Sebastian Michaelis (Black Butler)

Wait a second, isn’t a butler supposed to serve you, not the other way around?

21. Daijiro Ohara (Kochira Katsushika-ku Kameari Kōen Mae Hashutsujo)

20. Kiichi Goto (Mobile Police Patlabor)

Cagey and crafty, but also caring and with an outstanding moral compass, Goto has extensive managerial experience from serving as the head of Special Vehicle Section 2 (i.e. the Tokyo Metropolitan Police’s second giant robot squad).

Everyone who hates their job could probably see the upside of having a boss who’s got a massive bounty from the government on his head.

13. Atsushi Dojo (Library Wars)

12. Motoko Kusanagi (Ghost in the Shell)

11. Kakashi Hatake (Naruto)

10. Shinya Kogami (Psycho-Pass)

9. Roy Mustang (Fullmetal Alchemist)

Like Patlabor’s Goto, Colonel Mustang is fiercely loyal to his subordinates, and should you be injured while on the job, there’s a chance he’ll use his alchemic control of fire to incinerate whoever’s responsible, as many times as necessary (no way he’s crying at your funeral, though).

8. Hozuki (Hozuki no Reitetsu)

7. Toshiro Hijikata (Gintama)

6. Akane Tsunemori (Psycho-Pass)

5. Hirosi Nohara (Craton Shin-chan)

4. Seijuro Akashi (Kuroko’s Basketball)

Being captain of a sports team has a lot of similarities with taking charge of a team of employees, right?

3. Frieza (Dragon Ball)

As we’ve talked about before, the invading alien martial artist actually has a number of fine managerial qualities, making Frieza the top pick among male survey respondents (plus there’s always the chance that he’d show off his sick dance moves after a couple of beers at company drinking parties).

2. Gintoki Sakata (Gintama)

Bolstered by a strong showing of female support, the laid-back White Demon didn’t crack the top 10 among male responses, but still snagged the second overall spot.

1. Levi (Attack on Titan)

Even more lopsided were the votes for Titan-slaying Levi. Like Gintoki, Levi didn’t show up in the men’s top 10 list, but he was the overwhelming favorite among the woman polled, with his 542 votes being more than 50 percent more than any other single character garnered.

Of course, we’re not entirely sure we’d like to have Levi as our supervisor, in light of the Attack on Titan spoiler that…

…the very first time we viewers tag along on one of his missions, it ends in failure with his whole team dead.

But hey, there’s no denying that when it comes time to fight naked giants with a pair of swords, Levi does it like a boss.